"People say a dog is a man's best friend, so why does mine refuse to share my sorrow with me?" Wong Kar-Wai, aided by cinematographer Chris Doyle, emerged as the most distinctive filmmaker of the late 1990s with this elliptical essay on love and mystery.
It's very much a film of two parts, following two distinct threads as neon-lit, night-time stories bleed into each other. The plot, such as it is, follows two just-ditched policemen (Takeshi Kaneshiro and Tony Leung), who are drawn to contrasting women, Brigitte Lin as a femme fatale and Faye Wong as a less dangerous but equally unusual waitress.